


Academia

by tiger_moran



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (Downey films)
Genre: Kissing, M/M, University
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-09
Updated: 2013-12-09
Packaged: 2018-01-04 04:41:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1076653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiger_moran/pseuds/tiger_moran
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the prompt: I'd love to see something with Moriarty's academic career--maybe Moran watching Moriarty interact with his students or sitting in on one of his lectures, or maybe Moriarty getting slightly drunk and telling Moran embarrassing stories about his own student days (which he later denies, of course). Setting (and whether or not Moriarty is an army coach or a famous mathematician) are totally up to you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Academia

  It’s pleasant to sit and watch the professor like this, relaxing after taking one class and before heading to the next, just casually dunking a biscuit into his tea before eating it, at work but not working at the thing for which he employs Moran. This is Moriarty at his official work, not being the criminal mastermind and the man who plots and orchestrates grand and illegal schemes and has control over many hundreds of men (and women) whether they know it or not. Like this he is still smart and clean but softer, without the more austere-looking darker, sharper suits; with his shirt a little more rumpled and his hair flopping over his forehead, and Moran finds this side of him as enchanting and fascinating as that other side.

    Moran does not understand higher mathematics. He has glanced over the works that have brought Moriarty fame in certain circles, as well as some of the texts that line the shelves in the professor’s study, and could not make head nor tail of them. Yet he still loves to attend Moriarty’s lectures and sneak in the back of his classes, ostensibly because though Moriarty is not being the arch criminal here still he may have enemies who might try to take advantage of his seeming lack of awareness and protection here and try to assassinate him, but really mostly because simply he enjoys watching and listening to Moriarty talk.

    The words, the language, the complex and convoluted terminology matter little to Moran. It is the professor’s voice that captivates him, that and his enthusiasm for what he lectures upon. Moran may not understand most of it but the way Moriarty speaks makes it far from being the dry, tedious lessons that formed most of Moran’s experiences with mathematics tutors as a boy. Moriarty’s enthusiasm for the subject shines through, lending him an almost boyish air himself, making his eyes sparkle with the love of the subject and helping him to look younger than his years, and it is apparent to Moran that his students find him enthralling also. Even the most rowdy of them tends to become quiet when Moriarty speaks, and aside from those few young men who are evidently only here because they are being forced to go through further education under threat of having their allowance cut off if they do not (and even they tend to fall silent when the professor talks) clearly his young pupils are rapt by him.

    Sometimes Moran cannot help but feel a little pang of jealousy when Moriarty is paying more attention to these young men than to him, but then he remembers that of course none of them will ever get to go home to the professor after class or know what it is like to kiss him or to sleep beside him or what he looks like when he comes. These are things that exist for him alone. Besides, on occasion the professor will catch Moran’s eye mid sentence and give him the smallest of smiles, a gesture that says clearly that though Moran is not a part of this world of academia, he is and always will be a part of Moriarty’s world.

    Moriarty’s students, for their part, have never quite dared to speculate (at least in front of him) as to why this slightly furtive-looking man who would seem to be not quite of their class and certainly not of their age attends some of the classes Moriarty teaches, but then that is perhaps the nature of such people to behave so: best to ignore it and hope it goes away. Besides, the professor is generally regarded as being somewhat eccentric and so if he wishes to befriend such a being then that is his business. At least the colonel is always discreet, smartly if not particularly expensively dressed and smells of nothing more unpleasant than cigarette smoke, so their professor could certainly have found himself a much worse acquaintance.

    So after drinking his tea Moriarty now takes his next class and Moran sits off to the side, apart from the students but not at all self-conscious about this distance between himself and them, with a half-smoked cigarette from earlier tucked behind his ear, and he watches. He watches the professor talking and projecting his speech around the room, silencing the smart alecs of the group with a pointed look and a raised eyebrow while occasionally addressing a particular pupil, gently coaxing answers out of those who are somewhat more nervous about speaking in front of the rest without ever attempting to humiliate them. He watches Moriarty’s hands too, as he accompanies his speech with hand gestures, or when he writes in his elegant script upon the blackboard, smudging a little chalk dust over his sleeve and the lapel of his jacket as he does so. And of course, because Moran is Moran, he occasionally lets his gaze drop to rest on Moriarty’s lower body, admiring the shape of his backside and his strong thighs through his clothing.

    The second time Moran does this Moriarty turns and catches him at it and Moran, because it is the thing he should do when caught ogling the professor in a room full of people, drops his gaze for a moment, only to lift it again a second later while smirking to himself. It does not pass him by that instead of appearing angered by the focus of Moran’s gaze, the corner of Moriarty’s mouth quirks into a tiny grin as he turns back to face the blackboard.

    Moran glances at the board himself, following the professor’s hand again as he writes formulae up there, strings of numbers and signs and symbols which may as well entirely be in Greek to Moran (even though Moran is somewhat better with mastering languages, at least in spoken form, than he is with understanding mathematical formulae). He is not a part of this world, true, but there is something reassuring to be found in being permitted to have a foot in it, to know that Moriarty does not see him merely as being his hired help for his more _clandestine_ activities.

   Of course after the lecture, when several of the young men crowd round the professor wanting to comment on something he had said or to ask him a question more privately, then Moran must wait his turn to get his professor to himself again. Sebastian Moran is nothing if not patient however, so he heads out just after the main body of the students, outside into the gravelled courtyard where he hangs back in the shadows and retrieves his cigarette from behind his ear, popping it back between his lips and relighting it. He breathes in its smoke gratefully, greedily even, and he waits.

    Some minutes pass before Moriarty exits the building, with various papers tucked under his arm and two enthusiastic students flanking him. One of the youths is seemingly deep in conversation with the professor, who smiles briefly and nods and occasionally says something that Moran doesn’t catch, while the other, the quiet one, Moran observes, has evidently been ordered by his companion to carry the professor’s books for him. Moran watches, marvelling at how relaxed Moriarty looks in this situation. The professor is by no means a nervous man but he is a tightly wound one who relishes being in control; one also prone to occasional black moods when that control is wrested from him or one of his carefully plotted schemes comes to nought. Here though he looks so much more laid back, knowing that he is in charge and quietly proud of being the centre of attention around which the students gravitate but with none of that tension and certainly none of the aura of danger about him, and the truly fascinating thing here is that it is not a lie. Moriarty does not pretend to be a professor solely for the sake of furthering his criminal career without suspicion or impediment. He truly _is_ a professor; the cap and gown and college rooms filled with books and papers and interesting items to aid study are no mere props, and this facet of his life is as valid as that other, and as valid too as the side of him he presents in his private life with Moran. It is this dazzling complexity of the man that has helped to draw Moran to him; the fact that he is comprised of many layers, and also that of all the people in the world it is Moran alone whom he has allowed to be privy to most of them.

    He tails the little group now (keeping a discreet distance between them) up to Moriarty’s rooms again, where he waits patiently once again outside while Moriarty converses with the two students inside for a minute or two while the taller fellow continues to rabbit on and the shorter one puts the professor’s books away for him. When they leave he hangs back still, so that he can observe without being noticed by the students, and he sees Moriarty shake the hands of the two young men and give the shorter one a brief, friendly clasp of the shoulder – nothing too intimate but as if to show his gratitude to him for carrying his books.

    “You had best come in here,” Moriarty calls without so much as a glance at Moran, once the two students have disappeared off down the corridor, and Moran slinks from his hiding place and follows the professor into the study.

    There he glances over at the bookshelves, noting that a couple of the books have been put back in crookedly and in the wrong order, and he sniffs disdainfully and immediately goes to put them right. “You need someone to carry books, Professor, you could’ve asked me.”

    “I’d have thought that had I asked you, then you would have claimed that it was beneath you to perform such menial tasks.”

    “I wouldn’t. Don’t mind menial tasks when I’ve got nought better to do.”

    Moriarty thinks about suggesting that Moran find himself a new hobby, for it is rather strange that Moran seems to want to spend so much time with him even when he isn’t carrying out a particular job for him. But he does not say this, for he does not find Moran’s company unpleasant.

    “I’m afraid, Sebastian, that you shall have to amuse yourself for an hour or two shortly,” he tells him, after drawing Moran closer to him, settling his arms loosely around Moran’s body. “I have a private meeting scheduled with a student in a little less than five minutes.”

    Moran presses even closer to him, knowing perfectly well that when they stand here that nobody outside can see them (Moran is an expert in finding lines of sight, after all). “What if _I_ was to schedule a private meeting with you for later?” he enquires, dipping his head to kiss under Moriarty’s jaw. “I think, Professor, I may be in need of a little private tuition myself.” He feels Moriarty’s breath catch in his throat as he trails his tongue across the professor’s pulse point, and Moran is a bastard at times and he knows he could well put the professor into no fit state to meet with a pupil in a very short space of time. He is not _that_ much of a bastard though, not to Moriarty and not when his respectable career is at stake, so he refrains from doing anything too stimulating. He does however say, “And I ain’t so good at my sums, sir, so I reckon you might want to discipline me for that, maybe take the ruler to my backside.” He grins wickedly also, his blue eyes twinkling with amusement.

    “Yes,” Moriarty says, and his voice only _just_ quavers. “Perhaps a little chastisement might be necessary.” He takes Moran’s head between his hands and pulls him up to kiss him on the lips, quickly and chastely, but affectionately, before he says, “I will put it in my diary for this evening. Would six O’clock suit you?”

    “It would suit me admirably, Professor.” Moran presses into another kiss, this one longer, deeper and considerably less chaste before he pulls away, still grinning. “Until later then.”

    “Yes, until later, Moran,” Moriarty murmurs, watching him depart.

    As Moran opens the door he finds a young man standing there with a hand just raised to knock. Moran tips his hat at the lad before slipping away, leaving the youth to wonder what that strange fellow is looking so smug about.

     “Come in, Smythe,” the professor calls from inside his study, and the boy enters, closing the door behind him, settling Moriarty back into his academic world for the next hour and thirty-eight minutes. He firmly pushes aside any lingering thoughts about the humble wooden ruler and interesting uses of said item. That can wait until later, when he is free to temporarily cast aside his professional face and wear his most private one again. So, until then, on with his meeting.


End file.
